


A Secret, a Start

by snarkyscorp



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Dirty Talk, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-20
Updated: 2012-08-20
Packaged: 2017-11-12 13:19:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/491473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snarkyscorp/pseuds/snarkyscorp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It starts with a secret. They hide it between buildings when they're both out for a night without his shadow leading the way. They press it between crates by the docks downtown when two separate missions collide. And they intensify it over rooftops under moonlit skies with the breeze at their backs in the warm Gotham night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Secret, a Start

**Author's Note:**

> Fucking with DCU timelines because I love Dick working/living in Blüdhaven and the life of these boys before Damian enters the picture and all that. Tim's age is never mentioned, so you can go as perverted or as age-appropriate as you like in your heads. ;)  
> Unbeta'd, because I don't currently have a Batman beta. This was a gift fic for my partner, so I figured it wouldn't matter too much, but please let me know if you see any mistakes.

It starts with a secret.

It's a secret from Bruce, mostly, but also from the world. They hide it between buildings when they're both out for a night without his shadow leading the way. They press it between crates by the docks downtown when two separate missions collide. And they intensify it over rooftops under moonlit skies with the breeze at their backs in the warm Gotham night.

It starts with a secret. A single kiss. An _accident_ , Dick thinks, because essentially it was an accident first...

The fall doesn't kill him. Bruce had told him years ago that protecting Gotham wasn't about escaping the bad guys but escaping yourself. Insecurities biting at your heels and boy does Dick have enough of those to load him down when he miscalculates a jump from one building to the other and goes _down_ hard enough to crack his skull. If it wasn't for the reinforced grips on the toes of his boots and the sheer strength of his acrobatics (and the luck of a faulty pipe bent out of shape enough for ihim to grab hold of), Dick would have splattered on the concrete eight stories down for sure.

When he skids to a halt midway between the two buildings, he's six stories above a piss-puke alley and bleeding, bruised, winded. He thinks about what might have been and chuckles quietly, shaking his head. If Batman had been there, he'd have called it _sloppy_. Dick knows it's sloppy without being told.

The truth is, the accident that sends him skidding between buildings is his own doing, his fault. Usually, he's got it together but tonight is the anniversary of his parents' death. That complicates things.

Bruce would have told him that it shouldn't, but Bruce was never one to talk about the effect his parents' death had on his life either. Plus, Bruce isn't here.

That, somehow, only makes it worse.

When he tries to make it up the building, the thought of Bruce sends him spiralling another story down. Dick grunts at the rough landing, knocking his head against the unforgiving metal on the fire escape.

By the end of things, he's got more cuts and scrapes than even a fight with Bane could have given him. And, yeah, it's pretty pathetic that he didn't have to get into a brawl to wind up so bad off. But with his head fogged with the memories of his parents to sidetrack him, he knows he's lucky just to come out of things alive.

That's when things really get complicated.

"You know, for a former acrobat, you sure do fall down a lot."

The voice belongs to none other than Tim Drake. Tim _Wayne_ now, but that's beside the point. Dressed in a familiar suit—the Robin emblem and the yellow of his cape catching the light—Tim is crouched atop the adjoining building, the one Dick tried to catch and couldn't. The mask doesn't do much to cover the amusement in his eyes. Usually, Tim isn't so snarky. It must be a slow night.

"Kick a man while he's down," Dick hums, forcing himself to his feet. He can't help the wry grin that finds its way to his lips, one corner at a time. "I thought you were the nice one. What gives?"

Tim's face falls. "Sorry. You need a hand?"

"A joke." Dick climbs to the top of the fire escape, his bones cracking in several places he knows they probably shouldn't. Nothing a hot shower and a good two hours' sleep can't fix, though. "A hand would be great, though. I'm, uh, a little off tonight."

A little off is an understatement. Tim knows that, though. He's too smart not to see it written all over Dick's face. Too smart not to know what day it is. His little brain is like a catalogue that's nearly as matured as Bruce's. An impressive knowledge base of shit Dick doesn't need to know and stuff he wishes he did.

Tim jumps over the space between the buildings like it's nothing, a graceful arch that...well, Dick probably taught him. Years ago. Dick's grin widens as he accepts the hand up, using Tim's grip and his own strength to force his body up the wall, atop the building's ledge, and then over it, landing in a rather inelegant pose at the top. His muscles are pulsing in that familiar way they do when he's overexerted himself. It's probably that he hasn't slept in twenty-four hours, too. Might have something to do with tonight's escapades.

"Where's Dad?" Dick can't resist.

" _Batman_ is in Metropolis, smartass."

"Ooh-ho, that's some mouth, kiddo. You don't clean that out before you put on the suit?"

"You never did."

Tim is grinning. It's good to see him smile, good to smile with him. There was a time he didn't know quite what to make of the brainy kid who figured out his identity based on a somersault, but whatever confusion he had to begin with, it's gone now, replaced with absolute respect for what Tim has brought to the Robin persona, for what he's done for Bruce. Most times, Dick is just sad he didn't notice it sooner, that a mere kid who didn't know Bruce from John Doe had seen what Dick was unable to on his own.

He is endlessly thankful for Tim when he thinks on those days. Endlessly.

"You're okay?" Tim asks, persistent.

"A few bruises. Mostly my ego."

"You're scraped up too." Tim reaches out, the pads of his Kevlar-and-Nomex gloves flitting over a spot on Dick's torso, at his right flank. "There." A bit of the suit has peeled apart from something Dick can't even remember. Whizzing bullets? Skidding against the side of a brick wall? The stuff is too resilient for Dick to narrow it down. All he knows is that the touch of the rough material makes his skin prickle with goosebumps just then, the way it has been a lot lately when he thinks on Tim's lean body in spandex for too long.

Taking a step back, Dick nods. "Scraped, scuffed, bruised, and—"

"Tired," Tim finishes. He's not smiling anymore.

Dick can actually see the wheels turning, can actually tell the exact moment that Tim starts trying to figure him out. Dick can practically hear the questions he asks himself. _Is it really just the dead parents thing? Because he doesn't do this every year. Or does he and I just never noticed?_ And then the endless feeling of missing some big piece in the puzzle of Dick's recklessness. Dick knew better than anyone that being trained by a detective was something that stuck with you. For life. And missing a piece, just one little piece, could drive a guy like Tim insane.

"Hey." Against his better judgement, Dick presses the large palm of his hand to Tim's shoulder. Squeezes. "I'm fine. Honest. Just having an off night. Don't put too much stock in that."

Tim's not convinced. "What happened to the reinforced titanium-plated suits from Wayne Tech? I thought Bruce gave you some."

"They were dirty. What? Some of us don't have Alfred to do our laundry 24/7."

Once again, Tim's hands are on him, feeling for tender spots that maybe are too tender for Dick to notice on his own. Dick can't stop him, so he doesn't even bother trying; instead, he watches the handsome lines of Tim's face dissolve into seriousness. He's better than most of them at this detective stuff. Could probably root out Dick's nightmares with a few well-placed words. When his fingers sink into something Dick can't see at the low jut of his hip, Dick winces and grabs his wrist, yanking it a little too roughly.

In the dark, their glittering eyes meet. Blue on blue. Dick has always wondered: is there something to that? Always blue. Different shades, maybe, but always blue.

"You need to patch that up," Tim whispers. 

Tim's voice is low. Hoarse. In the way it changes when he is no longer Tim but becoming Robin. Not a boy but something more. It makes Dick want things he knows he has no business craving, but his hand is already reaching and his throat is already parched and he thinks if he gets one good grip he'll be able to stop himself.

That's when it happens—the accident.

Tim leans in out of nowhere just as Dick's hand is gripping the hell out of his thigh, and then their mouths are pressed tight and somewhere in there Tim's lips have parted and he's running his tongue—his goddamn _tongue_ —against Dick's lips like he's been planning that for years. Like he knows what he wants, what he's doing, how to get it.

Dick groans and his free hand hauls the back of Tim's neck like whiplash. Close, _closer_. He drinks him in, every last drop, because Dick _has_ been waiting for this and it's only now that he's ever had a chance alone, without their great protector swooping in to take his bird back to the nest. Dick relishes in the taste of Tim—clean and minty like he brushed his pretty white teeth before patrol and even that drives Dick up a wall, because he probably did. Good to the last drop, down in his very core.

It's not long before the kiss has deepened, before they're fumbling across the building. Tim tugs him in one direction, but Dick laughs, breaking the kiss to give him a little shove. Enough to distance them.

"Not gonna happen," he says, chuckling. There have to be rules. They can't go to Wayne Manor, and despite if that upsets Tim, it's just how things are. And yeah, sure, improper time to laugh, but it's sort of funny, how Tim thinks years of being on the wrong side of Bruce's arguments and lectures are going to evaporate based on one kiss.

"Blüdhaven is too far."

They both stare at one another, and then suddenly, Tim laughs too.

"Not that I'm, y'know, in a rush or anything."

Dick's grin is back, and he advances like Tim has given him a green light for life. He sort of has. "Oh yeah? No rush?" He runs his hands up Tim's body, able to feel the shift and heat of every muscle. Thank God for that Robin uniform, the way it molded to Tim like a glove. Like there was nothing between them at all, and didn't _that_ thought get Dick wound up too? "That's not what it felt like to me, _Robin_." He nips at Tim's lower lip, aroused as fuck to get a moan in return.

They're kissing again after that, mouths insistent, impatient. Tim's hands claw at his uniform, even bolder than Dick's, touching everything—his shoulders, chest, biceps, flanks, hips, ass. Reverent but eager, the grips of his gloves catching on the Nightwing stripes, the symbol across his sternum and shoulder blades.

Then, the secret. Dick stops Tim before things gets too far of control. So they can breathe and look at each other, so that Tim will listen, because this next part? Yeah, it's pretty damn important.

"We can't let Bruce find out."

Tim's response is surprising—he laughs again. "Guess I should've turned off the comm link then."

Dick leans in, bites Tim's neck, grinning against his skin. "You're not too old for me to take across my knee and spank, you know."

"Counting on it, Dick."

***

It starts with a secret. It gets out of hand from there. Because the minute something is secret, Dick can't help but want to shout it from the rooftops.

It starts with that kiss, the promise not to tell Bruce, and it escalates from there, until it's past one in the morning and Dick's still sticking around Gotham, following Tim just to be beside him. First, it's just kissing. _Heavy_ kissing. Groping. Skipping surveillance because they're too busy exploring one another. But they stop when things get too good, because the same old excuses keep creeping in: Blüdhaven is too far, the Manor is off limits. By two in the morning, excuses aren't working.

So, instead of getting worked up about it, they patrol together. Dick figures he can at least finish out the evening. If he can last that long watching Tim in that uniform, that is.

"You never did tell me what you were doing in Gotham anyway," Tim says through the modified comm link (modified to link just the two of them—Tim's a genius with the hacking). He's taking one side of the building, and Dick's got the other. The plan is to meet in the middle, which happens to be the back of the warehouse, and from there, they'll take the drug runners out before they even get the shipment handed off at the docks.

"My parents are buried out here," Dick says, combing over his line of sight, along the edge of the building where he can see the docks and the incoming barge clear as day. The silence on the other line signals that Tim didn't expect that. Or that he did, so he's giving Dick a minute to collect himself. "And before you ask, I don't stay with you guys for obvious reasons. Easier to go back to Blüdhaven at the end of the night. But I gotta say, on nights like these—"

Dick jumps off the building then, knocking two thugs out cold with well-timed kicks to the backs of their skulls, using his body's weight on the push to take them down.

"—I sure do miss Gotham." When Dick looks up from where he's crouched atop the two unconscious guards, he spots three more coming his way. Instead of backing off, he waves at them, smiles. "Hey, guys. Look, your friends and I were just talking. Nothing to get worked up over. Why don't we all just be cool?" All three of the men raise their guns. "Or...y'know, not."

Before they can fire, a tiny little black pellet drops between them. Then one more. And then another. The smoke erupts almost instantly, bathing the area in a hazy, gray fog. From there, it's easy work for two people. Two-on-three isn't a fair fight, even worse bathed in smoke, but working alongside Tim, Dick's a little distracted by how right it feels, how much he's missed this. Blüdhaven is where he lives, but sometimes he really thinks that Gotham is still his home.

As the smoke clears, it's only Tim and Dick, Robin and Nightwing, who are left standing. It takes everything Dick has not to put his hands on Tim as a reward for a job well done. Looking at Robin like that, he knows he's not the only one with dirty thoughts clouding his mind.

The sirens sound. Gotham police never fail, even when they're so late to the party it's barely even funny. Dick glances at the barge coming in. The driver there is innocent, or at least that's what Oracle's intel told them: the man, Sampson Lourdes, is as by the books as they go with barely a parking ticket to his name. Needless to say, that means their job here is done. Before Robin can get the quick-release grapple out of his belt, Nightwing's hand is on his wrist, the blue-striped fingers of his gloves curling around the rough plane of Robin's bracer, insistent.

"Maybe I'll come with you," he says. "Home, I mean. Just for a little while."

Tim's grin is still so full of innocence. How does he manage that, given the things that they do every night? "That's great, Nightwing, but I've got a few more stops before I can head home."

Robin gently pries his arm free, fires the grapple, zips his way off into the sky, and Dick has to groan to himself, to roll his eyes. He leaps for the lamp post, using it to swing himself up onto the ledge of the building, from there to the roof and a quick jump to the next. He turns on the comm just to say, "Tease," and then follows where Robin leads.

***

Dick remembers how it is. Wearing the suit, obeying commands with Pavlovian accuracy, little side missions that Bruce gives out like treats on Halloween. It's frustrating. Or at least, it was to Dick when he was in Tim's shoes. Unlike Dick, Tim handles it all with the kind of grace that he could only pray for in his wildest dreams. He watches Tim work through the list of regular hotspots—Crime Alley, the Bowery, a few new points uptown—and that grace is there too in every impromptu order from Bruce through the comm link, the little errands that Dick used to bitch and moan about. Tim doesn't. Tim handles them. Handles everything.

It's easy to see why Tim's better at being Robin, but Dick feels nothing but pride watching him, relishes in fighting by his side, helping him.

After taking out his group of street thugs, Dick perches on top of the arch of the Gotham Museum, stretching out, watching Tim finish up on his own. He's strong enough to take them down, to tie them up. He knows what he's doing and it makes Dick ache in new ways for him.

"You ready to go home yet, Princess?" he asks through the comm.

" _Princess_?" Tim scoffs. "What, are you Jason now?" When he looks up and spies Dick on the arch, he rolls his eyes playfully. "I think that's it." It takes him only a second to grapple up to the arch with him, a second more to retract it, another to crouch over Nightwing's body like he doesn't know what that does to Dick below him, and one more to reconfigure the comm. "Alfred?" A pause. "I'm, uh, bringing a guest with me. Can you maybe not tell Bruce tonight?" Another pause, a beaming smile spreading across his face as he laughs. "Good guess. I owe you one. See you soon."

Tim looks down at Dick, leans in. He's still crouched right over him, their bodies close, the warmth from their suits somehow hotter even though it's all temperature controlled. The logic of it doesn't stand up against the impossible heat Dick feels just being near Tim tonight. Tim lowers himself, slowly, one knee and then the other, until he's straddling Dick's waist with his hands braced to either side of his neck into the brick of the building. They're hidden in the shadow of the high arch, but even Tim has to know how the GCPD are—they just love sending in helicopters, and if they don't, GCN will. Only a matter of time before someone gets an eyeful and the front page of the _Gotham Gazette_ has this nice little pose all over it and then so much for secrets and Blüdhaven won't be far enough away to keep Bruce from strangling him.

"Alfred says hello," Tim quipped, his voice barely above a whisper. He sinks down a little lower, ass resting light on Dick's pelvis, a weight that's only enough to take note of. A tease.

Dick laughs, a slightly inappropriate response, because his hands are already grabbing at Tim's waist to haul him down further, to make this all less of a tease, more of a reality. "Can we not talk about Alfred right now? Kinda killing the mood."

Tim bites his lip, and Dick knows that expression: he's holding back a laugh of his own. "Come on, Nightwing," he says, rather abruptly standing and offering his hand. "To the Bat Cave."

Dick groans. "I hate saying that."

"I know."

As they find their bikes and take off for Wayne Manor and the secret Cave entrance, Dick feels a strange sense of excitement. It's admittedly been a while since he's visited, and while he knows Bruce might be angry later that he didn't wait around for him to return from Metropolis, Dick wants a little peace with his memories too, and a little time with Tim. Alone.

"Jason calls you princess? How did I not know this?"

Tim's laugh cracks through the comm link.

***

"Master Richard!"

Alfred has seen it all and practically done it all too, so that he's even excited to see Dick stepping off his bike and into the Cave is something of a surprise. That he is so excited his greeting is punctuated by an exclamation mark is something else altogether. Dick couldn't be happier to see him, too.

"Been too long, Alfred."

"If you think that six months, four days, and two hours is too long..."

Dick blinks, brows rising as he peels off his mask. "Obsessively counting much?" There's a rosy color on his cheeks from the adhesive where it bonded to his skin for the night, which he rubs at before stepping close to give Alfred a hug.

"Shall I fix you something to eat?"

Dick shakes his head. "No, that's all right. We were just—"

The sight of Tim peeling off his uniform is, admittedly, distracting. He's growing up fast, so fast that Dick can barely remember what he looked like that night he confronted Dick about being Nightwing, the night he confessed he knew Bruce Wayne was Batman. Back then, Tim was scrawnier than even Jason was at his age, lean in the way all the brainy kids usually are, and God, Dick remembers how nervous he was when Tim put on the suit, when he started training, when Dick saw the drive in his eyes and the way he and Bruce worked together like two parts of the same consciousness. How jealous he'd been, for just a second, seeing how good Tim and Bruce were and knowing he'd never get that back for himself.

Now, Tim is no longer the scrawny kid who took classes after school to try and bulk up—he's an athlete, toned and hard-bodied and beautiful under the Cave's impersonal lighting. He's as good as Dick, as Jason, as Bruce. And while he might still be young, he's grown up so much over the past few years that Dick sees the man he will become in the lines that draw his face. Those blue eyes that have already seen so much. That dark hair that's grown in thick and wild. That graceful slope in his shoulders that's broader now. Those hard and hard- _earned_ muscles in his stomach that shift when he breathes.

"I'll leave you to it, then," Alfred says, a hint of amusement in his tone as he moves to Tim and takes his gauntlets, gloves, bracers, and mask, helping him organize them. "Master Bruce just phoned. He won't be home for another hour at best."

"Everything okay in Metropolis?"

Tim is down to his briefs. _His briefs_. 

"I believe so, sir. He merely sounded busy."

Not part of the costume—his _actual underwear._

"Right. Busier than usual?"

Boots and tights and belt and tunic removed already. And goddamn it, it's like he knows what it does to Dick, because when he stretches out a muscle group with a roll of his shoulders, arms above his head like Dick taught him, that can't be by coincidence that the muscles flex and show. Coincidences are for people who don't see patterns.

"Nothing he cannot handle or he would have sent a distress signal as per routine."

How Bruce gets any work done with Tim walking around like that is beyond Dick, who can't even move seeing him like that. And without a spare set of civvies, Dick has to stick it out in his torn Nightwing suit for this.

"I know. I just worry, Alfred. He likes to take these missions on by himself, and, well... there's a reason I'm his partner, y'know? Sometimes, I don't think he knows the definition of the word."

His _very unforgiving_ Nightwing suit. While Tim struts around in his _briefs_. God help him.

"I'm sure everything is fine, Master Timothy."

Despite his internal monologue, Dick has been listening and chooses this moment to step forward and lay a hand on Tim's shoulder. "If Bruce is in Metropolis, he's in good hands, Tim. Anyway, you're his partner, but that doesn't mean he'll give up the solo stuff. You know as well as I do how he is about—"

"I know, I know," Tim interjects. " _His secrets have secrets_. I know."

"He's fine," Dick repeats.

"Well, if I'm not needed, there's still laundry to finish." Alfred smiles at both of them before he takes a tray and some empty teacups up the stairs. The sound of the elevator rising echoes through the cave. Then, nothing.

Silence.

Dick grins. "Nice performance."

Tim stretches his arms above his head again, lean muscles shifting, tightening. When he breathes in, they stiffen; out and they relax. "Don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh, you don't, huh?"

"Nope." He tips his body, bending back, then forward, easing the tension out. "But I do have one question for you?"

"What's that?"

Tim leans against the medical bay's broad table, cocks his head, and arches. Some kind of move that nobody taught him but he learned by himself, and that alone drives Dick up a wall. That and the fact that Tim holds his stare, reads it, sees through him in the same way Bruce does—instantly and thoroughly, like a Kryptonian power but so much hotter.

"Why are you all the way over there?"

Dick growls. The sound is...it's not right. He wants to take things slow, savor this because who the hell knows when a night this good will come along again, but he can't. He can't still his hands from hauling Tim's ass up to lift him onto the table, can't stop his mouth from biting its way to Tim's, can't stop his tongue from swiping in to open his lips, and can't stop his body from rocking forward, nor the grunt on his lips and the growls in his throat from sounding between them like thunder.

Tim's hands wind into his hair and pull. Dick knows they should go upstairs to be alone in a proper place, but the idea of having to actually wait is an impossible thought, and to do this with Tim in the Bat Cave seems fitting somehow. Where everything started. Where everything goes. Home and so much more than that and the first time he put Tim through the ringer and the night he watched Tim don the costume and even a night when Bruce was out, sneaking pizza in and talking until three in the morning to sneak out before Bruce finds him. It's all here. Memory and feeling and endless pride, affection, respect.

"God, can't get enough of you," Dick groans. His voice isn't his own. It belongs to Tim then, like the rest of him: blood, bones, skin, and soul. Dick needs this like he needs breath in his lungs.

"Then don't stop," Tim pants. He's just as greedy, and Dick has to wonder how long Tim has been harboring these feelings, too, because if Dick was supposed to notice, he sure as hell missed that boat. "I don't want you to stop."

"I won't." It's a promise. A plea.

"Even if I beg you."

Dick sinks his teeth into Tim's shoulder, and he knows he's left a mark when he lifts his mouth away, but it thrills him thinking Bruce might see it, later. "Jesus."

"Even after I come, want you to keep going, and don't stop, until you're done with me."

If there was any question where this was headed, leave it to Tim to spell it out for them both, to leave no question unanswered. Dick loves that about Tim, how everything is black or white, balanced or imbalanced, pure or dirty. Tim and his logic and his being so good for Bruce that it makes Dick feel almost sick with desire for this beautiful boy who changed their lives.

"You're so fucking _good_." Dick was panting, overwhelmed, completely on fire with how bad he wanted Tim. Instead of analyzing it, weighing the pros and cons, he does the thing Bruce hates but that's part of who he is—he jumps in headfirst and goes from there.

When his hand falls atop the bulge in Tim's briefs, Dick relishes in the whine that rips out of Tim's throat. Not even a moan. Not a moan or grunt but a whine. Keening and desperate, buzzing through Dick's bones like a live wire. He palms Tim's length for a few seconds, but that's all he allows himself before he tugs the waistband down, down, down, letting it snugly hug under Tim's balls. The elastic nudges Tim's balls up against his shaft, putting him on display. Dick barely lets himself watch Tim lean back, so pretty like this, before he takes Tim's cock into his mouth and works his way down the shaft.

Dick doesn't wait. He takes Tim down as far as he can go, until the crown is pushed up at the back of his throat; then pulls away and gently jerks what he can't fit between his lips with two fingers and his thumb. He feeds Tim's length into his mouth inch by inch, bobbing his head, slurping him down, getting his swollen cock wet.

" _Yeah_..." Tim is panting the word. A litany. A plea in the damp air. One of his hands finds Dick's hair again, but he only manages to cradle Dick's skull. Doesn't pull or insist; just holds him and follows his motions. "T-Take it. Dick, please, wanted it so, so long, I just...I..."

A laugh escapes Dick, forces him to pull off. Inopportune, but he's so drunk with this feeling that he can't hold it back. It grinds into a moan midway through, and then Dick is reverently licking the mushroom head of Tim's crown, tonguing the slit, relishing the texture of his frenulum.

"How long?"

Tim whines again and his fingers tense.

" _How long_? C'mon. Tell me. How long you been thinking about this? About me. About my mouth on your pretty little cock."

Above him, Tim shudders. Dick watches Tim's stomach clench, then lower as a drop of precome drools from the head of his cock, and he laughs again, dumbly, absolutely high with how it feels to be doing this, finally doing it, knowing Tim's been waiting too. Dick is practically delirious with want.

"A long time," Tim whispers. "Please don't make me say it."

So Dick doesn't make him. Instead, he reaches for one of the drawers to the side of the medical bay and finds the jar of Albilene, a medicinally-effective, water-based lubricant created by Wayne Chemicals years ago. Bruce swears by the stuff for everything from smoothing rough skin to healing burn wounds, and Dick knows, from experience, that it's perfect for other things too. He wastes no time swiping enough on his fingers to last and grins at Tim as he presses the tips of two slicked fingers against his asshole.

By now, Tim is nearly off the table, and that makes it easy. Dick smoothes the wrinkled furrow of his hole with both fingers, watching the way it squeezes when Tim thinks he's going to shove in, and when he _does_ , it catches Tim off guard enough that Dick can just press his finger all the way. His blue eyes blink, gaze jumping to watch Tim's face, how the blush spreads and his lips part and he gasps, how Tim's eyes go unfocused for just long enough. And Dick remembers that feeling. Having someone's finger inside him, thrusting, prying.

"I almost can't stand it," Dick admits. "You know how bad I want this? God, I can't wait to get my—"

"I've watched you my whole life."

Dick has just pressed his second finger in, impatient, and Tim's confession doesn't help.

" _Tim_..."

"I've watched you m-my whole life," he repeats. Tim slumps on the table, spreads his legs, braces his heels on the edges of the table, giving Dick the best view of his life. "No, no, don't stop, I told you not to stop, Dick, you promised." Tim grabs his hand, shows Dick how he wants it. A little faster, two fingers prying him wide. "Just...let me talk while you stretch me."

"Jesus."

"I watched you, and I wanted to be a part of all this, of your life, and then, when you took me seriously—Dick, I was only a kid and you listened to me—I just wanted to be good enough for you. And then you—nn—you trained me, helped me, and I don't care what happened between you and Bruce, but I'm se-selfish and I just want to be in your life, and so I've wanted this since then, since you looked at me like I could be your equal and not like some kid infringing on your life."

The impromptu speech seems to have taken all the wind out of Tim. He lays back and takes Dick's fingers, thrusting up against him, and Dick can't wait another second. He pulls his fingers free, smearing the excess lube on Tim's hole, and finds the hidden zip in his suit, pulls his own cock out and gives it a few good strokes.

"And I kept waiting for one of these nights, when you'd notice," Tim says. "Glad you finally did."

Dick's grin is easygoing, soft. He leans in to nip at Tim's mouth. There are words he can't say. Not right now. Those are words for later. Another time and place.

"Me too," he says instead. "C'mere already."

Dick's hands are sure and steady on Tim's thighs, pulling him closer, hanging his ass off the table completely now, and the angle is perfect, so Dick holds Tim's weight in one hand and uses the other to guide himself in. And in. And in. All the way, no stopping, not until his cock is buried balls deep and Tim is bucking beneath him, against him, and then he pulls back and thrusts right back in.

The medical table is bolted to the cave's stone-solid ground, but it still seems to creak with the force of Dick's thrusts.

"More," Tim pleads. "God, don't-don't stop."

"Not gonna." Dick thrusts. Harder. Faster. Riding into Tim like a storm. "Not until I'm done with you. Remember? Not until I'm _done_ , Tim, and fuck, I'm gonna take my time with this. All night if I need to. You think you can take me all night, Tim?"

"Yeah. Yeah, please, just-just do it, yeah, do it, fuck me."

Dick leans down and Tim leans up and they're kissing. Hard. Biting. Mouths seeking and exploring. Tim's hands yank at his hair, pulling and clinging, and then Tim is hanging onto him and Dick is shouldering the load of his weight, lifting him by his ass with both hands. Dick has to brace his legs far apart, has to bend at his knees, but he doesn't care. He's sweating so bad, excess dripping off his nose, but he holds Tim up and bouncing Tim's ass on his cock, fucking him.

Finally, Tim lowers his legs and slides off, out. Chuckles breathlessly at the sight of Dick standing there with his cock jutting out impatiently.

"Exactly what I want," Tim murmurs. "Make me come. Like this."

Tim bends himself over the table, ass up, legs spread. There's no better invitation in the world, so Dick takes it and takes Tim. Thrusting in. Hard. Unrelenting. Bruising Tim's pert little ass in the process, hearing his balls slap against Tim's perineum, the slick sound of it all deafening in his ears. He holds Tim's ass with one hand, spreading the hole with his thumb to watch his own length go deeper, to watch Tim take everything he has to give. And when he can't stand it anymore, he reaches out and digs his hand into Tim's hair, clenches at the thick strands, pulls him into a beautiful, nearly impossible arch. The kind of thing that Dick could do by nature but Tim's body had to learn.

"God, _God_ ," Dick praises. Just watching Tim bend like that gives him all kinds of ideas, fantasies they could fulfil later, because this isn't over after tonight. It is just beginning.

Tim arches for him, moans, and Dick looks down in time to see Tim's arm. The way it jerks, there's no mistaking what Tim's doing and that he's even remotely close gets Dick off.

"Gonna fill you up," Dick tells him.

"Yeah... Yeah, do it, fill me, Dick, God, do it."

Dick's hand massages Tim's scalp, musses his hair and forces his head down with a heady smile when Tim lets him and bends until the dip in his spine is almost obscene. He strokes his hand along Tim's skull, down the nape of his neck, over his shoulder blades, the center of his back, pressing firmly into the soft small of it where he lets his palm rest, where he feels Tim quivering.

And then it's over. Dick groans as he comes, as he spills himself inside Tim's hole and fills it up just like he promised. He rides the incredible high until it's impossible to hold on any longer, and then pulls out of Tim to watch the excess come squish and pulse out of his ass.

Instead of pulling away completely afterward, Dick crowds Tim in against and over the table and reaches under his flat, taut belly to grab his cock. His fingers wrap firmly around it, still wet with lubrication, and he pulls the foreskin back with one slow stroke before beginning a firm, quick rhythm. It's designed to get Tim off, and it works. It only takes another few minutes before Tim bucks and whines, his release splattering onto the floor and spilling over Dick's thick, calloused fingers.

When all is said and done, Dick spins Tim around and kisses him. Their bodies are sweaty, messy, but it's so good. To hold Tim against him, to feel every inch of his naked body, to know this won't be the last time they get to do it. Bruce be damned.

Later, Dick won't remember how they made it from the Cave upstairs to Tim's bedroom, but sneaking around the Manor at all hours in his Nightwing uniform so they don't alert Alfred is a thrill in itself. By some miracle, they wind up in Tim's bed, together, and Dick doesn't care what may come after, because tonight's little accident is the best problem he's had in years.

***

When Dick wakes up, he knows immediately that something is wrong. It's not that he's lying beside Tim in a bed that's too small or that they're both naked or even that he's kind of half-hard just being pressed against Tim like this. No, it's none of that. What's wrong is that Tim's bedroom door is cracked open, a sliver of light bathing in from the hallway. The scent of Bruce's cologne is there like a ghost.

So much for keeping it a secret.

The open door is an invitation, a clue. Dick knows it, mostly because he knows better than anybody how Bruce thinks, that every little thing means something.

Slipping out of bed, Dick grabs his suit and began to step back into it. Well, he doesn't have any other clothes, and there is no way he is borrowing Tim's underwear to go have a heart-to-heart (i.e. an argument) with Bruce. Likewise, he can't exactly pad down the hall nude. So Nightwing is the best he could do.

Down the hall, the staircase, around the corner. He follows the smell of Bruce until it begins to dissipate. That's when he sees the study door. Wide open. It practically screams _Get your ass in here, Dick_ , and Dick has to grin remembering all the talks Bruce gave him in that room. Not even the fun father-son stuff about girls or sex but the _you can't let this path take you to a vengeful place_ speech that Bruce is so keen on, or, no, even better, the _I told you to wait, but you didn't listen to me and now we have a mess to clean up, so you're grounded from the suit for a week_. Yeah. Memories.

"Sooo," Dick hums, stepping in like he owns the place. He's not afraid of Bruce. Not anymore. Not even when he sees him sitting in that chair. The chair that belonged once to Thomas Wayne, that still smells like ancient leather because Bruce can't bring himself to allow it to be cleaned, that still has holes in it because Bruce can't bear to see it reupholstered. "You get an eyeful back there? If I'd have known you'd be home so early, I'd have made it more interesting."

"Dick."

"I mean, you should have seen what we were doing _before_ you opened the door."

" _Dick_."

Bruce's voice is sharper than cut glass, and it stings just as bluntly. It puts Dick on the defensive. He folds his arms, feels himself regressing. He's no longer Nightwing, being reprimanded for sex, but he's Robin, being reprimanded for...well, take your pick.

"What?" he spits, shaking his head. It's hard to look at Bruce when he's upset. It makes Dick feel ashamed, even if he hasn't done anything wrong. Which, case in point, he hasn't. "Seriously. What, Bruce?"

"I think I deserve an explanation."

Dick does look up then, his jaw set in a firm line, expression unguarded. "You want me to draw you a diagram?" At Bruce's withered stare, Dick relents. A bit. "Look, I ran into Tim earlier tonight while I was patrolling. My own patrol. I wasn't out looking for him. He let me hang around. We came back here." It's then that he has to stop, and Bruce's gaze feels like it's seeing through him. That stare flips a switch in Dick, heats him up to boiling. "Okay, it's like this: when two boys like each other—"

"Stop it."

"You wanted me to explain. So I'm explaining. That I like Tim, and he likes me, and—hang on, do you have any action figures I can use for a visual aid? Because it'd be easier if I could show you how we—"

" _Stop joking around_!" Bruce is up and out of Thomas Wayne's chair, his voice the growl of Batman that puts grown men on their knees, quaking in fear. It even makes Dick take a tentative step back. "You can make jokes all you want, but not now. Not about Tim."

"I'm serious. I like him."

"For how long?"

Dick's face gets warm. Warmer. Red. Like someone turned on a furnace under his skin.

" _For how long, Dick_?"

"Jesus, I don't know what to be pissed off at just yet. Are you insinuating I'm some kind of pervert or that I'm just using him for sex? Gimme a break and spell it out for me. We can't all be as smart as the World's Greatest Detective."

"Both."

"Oh good," Dick deadpans, laughing. There's no mirth in it. His eyes are hard as stones. "For a second there, I thought you were just being petty." When Bruce doesn't take his bait for a further argument, Dick rolls his eyes and sighs, stepping up to the desk, toying with a paperweight. Something fancy. Gold-plated. "I've been interested for a while. I never would have pushed it, though. And he's not just some notch in my belt, Bruce. I care about him just as much as you do."

"If you cared about him at all, you wouldn't have done that."

Dick's fingers clench over the paperweight. "Done what, _fucked_ him?" He grins at Bruce, happy to see that word has an immediate effect on him. He can almost feel how hard Bruce grinds his molars, can practically hear the grind of them. "You know, Tim's not just yours. You don't have a monopoly over what he wants to do, especially when it comes to what he wants to do with me."

"I adopted him. He's mine."

It's then that Dick must give away some tell, some flinch in his posture or a wince in his expression, because Bruce steps forward, crowds him against the desk with the kind of intimidation tactics that work on everyone.

"Is that what this is about?" Bruce snarls. "You getting even with me? With Tim? He's not your replacement, Dick."

There's a lump in his throat. A lump that hardens, that's been hardening for years. "Your words, not mine," Dick snaps. His voice, the tremble in it, is uncontrollable. Like a frightened, cornered animal, he balks, pushes against Bruce's chest lamely. Bruce barely budges so he does it again, harder. "God, stop it. Stop looking at me like that. I'd never hurt him. I would die for Tim!"

Bruce grabs his wrists, and it's so infuriating to still be so predictable in a fight against him. Bruce so easily incapacitates him, and unless he really wants this to turn physical, Dick is beaten. Held. Trapped. It forces their eyes to meet, broadcasts the hurt and anger in Dick's blue gaze.

"So would I," Bruce agrees, his expression still stoic. So stoic it makes Dick want to punch the look off his face.

"Okay, you'd both die for me," Tim interjects. "I'm flattered." Arms folded, he's standing in the doorway in his pajama pants and a tee. That Bruce didn't notice his presence is amusing, but not enough to deter Dick's aggression. Tim frowns, the kind of look that makes him appear about ten years older. "Now that that's settled, can we all sit down and have dinner?"

Bruce sighs, immediately pulling away, not even glancing at Tim. "You mean breakfast," he says.

Outside and beyond the Palisades, the sun is rising. Just barely. In the distance, Gotham probably shines, the sun catching on the facades of the skyline.

Dick pushes past Bruce, shouldering him hard enough to bruise. "I need some air." He doesn't need to ask; Tim steps aside before he can storm past, and he only feels a flicker of guilt leaving the room.

***

"You two are so alike."

Dick has been outside on the patio for the past half hour. It's been nice, just being alone at Wayne Manor, watching the sun rise over the pool, the gardens. He knows that sooner or later, he's going to have to go back inside, but he's been hoping it'll be more of the latter. When Tim speaks, Dick looks up and rolls his eyes.

"Funny."

"I'm serious."

Clenching his jaw, Dick stands up straight. He's been leaning against one of the decorative fountains the whole time. His back cracks as he stiffens his spine. "Tim, Bruce and I—we're _nothing_ alike. If you think we are, then you don't know me at all."

Dick only has a second to feel guilty about that remark. Only a second to regret being selfish enough to think he could keep this from Bruce and get away with it, that such a secret would be healthy for Tim to keep. Only a second of bitter silence before Tim breaks it.

"Dick, I've watched you my entire life," he says. He whispers the words. Like they only exist for Dick and this moment. "I know everything about you."

Leaning against the fountain, Dick looks up, at Tim's pointed, young face and the way his profile hints at the man he will become. In the light of a rising sun, he is almost stunning. It hits Dick just how much what he said to Bruce back in the study is true. That he would die for this boy. He would give his life to ensure Tim would be safe. No matter what.

"Okay," Dick says, smiling. One side of his mouth quirks higher than the other. "So Bruce and I are both stubborn and we care about you. Sue me."

Tim grins in return. "No. I'd rather bite you."

Laughing, Dick grabs Tim by his shoulders, hauls him close. "So c'mere and bite me, you tease." He leans in for a kiss, but Tim stops him. The look Tim gives him is so _Bruce_ -like that it's almost unnerving. And it definitely works in deflating his drive to take things back to a sexual level. "What?"

"You've got to talk to him."

"What, like, _now_? On an empty stomach? And with Venus in retrograde? I don't know."

Tim leans up, bites Dick's jaw and then pulls away, nodding. "Yes, now. Over breakfast. Alfred made potatoes the way he says you used to like them."

Dick groans. "Well, now I have to stay, don't I?"

"Yep. Bribery by food—Alfred's speciality."

Tim reaches for Dick's hand, tugs him into the Manor. Surprisingly, then, there's plenty of time for a kiss. A deep kiss that feels like it goes on forever. Dick's lips are sore by the time they come up for air, but even then he only does so begrudgingly. When he does finally pull away, he nearly jumps out of his skin, because Bruce is in the doorway. Not looking at them (in fact, making a point of looking everywhere else), but obviously, he's aware of what they'd been doing when he entered.

"Alfred's set out a change of clothes," Bruce says. His voice is stiff; formal but not terse. 

Tim must have talked to him too, a fact which on any other day would have pissed Dick off because he likes to handle things himself. But right then, he's kind of happy for Tim's involvement. Contrary to popular belief, Dick doesn't enjoy fighting with Bruce.

"Am I not allowed to sit at the big boy's table unless I put on my Sunday best?" Dick quips. His grin is casual, calm. He's actually joking, not baiting Bruce. Still, sometimes it's hard to tell.

"Don't respond to that," Tim tells Bruce. Tim's still holding Dick's hand, tugging him towards the hallway.

Bruce lets Tim pass but he stops Dick until Dick releases Tim's hand. Then, Bruce lets him pass, and Dick wonders if that's the most leeway he's prepared to give at the moment. Well, it's good enough for Dick just to be allowed to stay after all that. And when he sits down to breakfast at the dining table big enough for sixteen, he doesn't even hesitate to crowd on one side close to Tim and Bruce.

"So," Dick says, forking an entire piece of bacon to gnaw the end off. "Bruce. Can I court your daughter or what? I just—ow!"

Tim glares, having just kicked him under the table. Bruce has it in him to grin, the corner of one side of his mouth lifting.

It starts with a secret.

It's a secret from Bruce, at first, for barely a night. They hide it between buildings when they're both out for a night without his shadow leading the way. They press it between crates by the docks downtown when two separate missions collide. And they intensify it over rooftops under moonlit skies with the breeze at their backs in the warm Gotham night.

It starts with a secret, but it doesn't end that way.


End file.
